


Good Dog

by Dusty_Forgotten



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Dogs, Gen, Horror, Murder, Serial Killers, Snuff, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 03:48:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3275564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dusty_Forgotten/pseuds/Dusty_Forgotten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He likes your dog. Probably more than you do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Good Dog

Your dog knows someone’s coming before you do, barking and running in circles. She only shuts up when you throw a tin can at her. When you see the stranger approaching, you go for your rifle, but the man waves as he trudges down the hill to your makeshift camp. He looks like a fucking raider, with a bright blue mohawk like he’s a walking target, and a friggin’ _tire tread_ strapped to one of his shoulders.

But he jingles when he walks, and that’s not a cheap gun he’s carrying. You stand, and move out of the shade of the rocky outcrop for where your brahmin is tied near a puddle.

“Howdy!” calls a voice with the wrong accent for the word howdy. “Trade?”

You nod. “What caliber?”

“Ah, smart man!” He smiles broad as he steps up close, squeezing into what’s left of the shade you’re occupying. He stinks like a raider. Like death. “That’s a 12.7 and a .50.”

You turn to him slowly. “A fifty _what_?”

He grins. The teeth you can see are filed to points. “I’m guessing you don’t have it.”

“Guess not.” you reply, growing cautious as you reach into the pack. He keeps snapping one hand then clapping it to the other. You glance at the hills in case it’s a signal. You hope he’s just twitchy. 12.7 is a weird size bullet. You don’t have the box for it, you remember, 12.7 rounds stuffed in a 5.56 box. Maybe a 10mm. Fuck knows. “This might take me a minute.”

“No problem.” There’s a snap, and a slide of metal coming out of the sheath, and your hand’s halfway to your gun when you realize his knife’s not coming for you. It’s a full size combat knife, the kind you skin things with, and he’s _picking his teeth_ with it. You have a renewed desire to find these bullets as soon as humanly possible and get the fuck away from this whackjob.

You find the box (they were in with 20 gauges so you wouldn’t mix them up; you’re a dumbass who puts things in weird places so you’ll remember and then completely forgets) and count out the right ones. There’s seven; seven times three, that’s...

“I’ll give you fifteen caps.”

“Twenty-one.” You glare. His eyes are two different colours, and one of those isn’t just really dark brown when he shifts into the sun and back out, it’s fucking _black; shoot the mutie, shoot the fuckin’ mutie!_

He wipes the knife on his shirt. He’s not smiling anymore. “I’ll give you twenty if you throw in the Med-X.” He motions to the syringe sticking out of your med bag.

You scoff. “Med-X alone’s twenty.”

“That’s a dirty needle, I’ll have to find my own. Twenty caps for the lot.”

Twenty caps is a good meal, and a cold drink. You dump the bullets in his hand, and he stuffs them in his pocket, and counts your caps. “Wouldn’t happen to have any other chems, while I’m here?”

You hesitate to tell him, “I’ve got Mentats.”

“Agh, I’m good.”

Yeah, the one chem Fiends could really use. He’s gotta be a Fiend- or used to be a Fiend. You’ve never seen one this far from the city before. Your dog’s trying to nudge her way into the shade that’s already too crowded, short lead you’ve got her on tangling up in your legs. You kick her back. The Fiend frowns at that, slides the syringe into a different pocket and gets down on his knees. “Hey, girl. Aren’t you a pretty thing?”

She slobbers all over his hand, and he laughs, scratching her. “Don’t get too lovey-dovey or she’ll go soft.”

He tilts his head up, light catching on the black eye and reflecting it red. Wait, is that blood? Is his left eye filled with _blood_? How the fuck did that happen? “Bullshit. Spoil her a little and she’ll give her life for you.”

“Yeah, well,” you grumble, and jerk the brahmin’s halter as you start walking, “it’s time I get going.”

“Oh, hey, before that, I was wondering if you’d be interested in buying something I’ve come across?” You ruefully halt the brahmin. The dog yaps at you, and you tell her off.

Next thing you know, your rifle’s jammed into your back, your back’s jammed into the sharp sun-heated rocks, your feet off the ground, and you can’t breathe. He’s got both his hands around your throat, and you can gasp a little, kick a little, but he’s got calves like stone, and he’s squeezing the sides, the arteries. In a dozen seconds it’s already getting fuzzy. The dog’s barking, and that means she’s not biting, good for nothing bitch. You can get some sound out, try a scream. The Fiend shushes. You’re not sure if it’s for you or the dog. You pass out.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

You wake up to wet tickling on your face, like your dog licking when you oversleep. You kick her off as you usually do. Your head feels like you’ve got a killer hangover.

“Jo, heel.” Your eyes snap open to that voice. Oh, fuck. Not a nightmare.

Well, yes, a nightmare, because you’re hanging upside down in some shack, and there’s a Fiend calling your dog away from you. She trots over, her claws clicking on the metal floor, and you can see his filed teeth peek in a smile from across the room. “That’s a good girl!” he praises, leans in the middle to ruffle the fur of her scruff. “Now, sit.” She doesn’t understand that one; you never taught her that one. Tried teaching her to heel, gave up and tied her to the brahmin. “Jo. Sit.” She does. “Good girl!” He reaches into a jar he has in one hand, takes something out, and feeds it to her. It looks like jerky, but it’s too far away to tell. He puts the jar on a high shelf with a number of others, and opens the door, encouraging, “Go play!”

He’s still got half the smile stuck on his face when he shuts the door. He looks you over, and it fades. “She’s a sweet girl.”

You sneer a little. “Fuckin’ psycho.”

“It was Jet this time.” he corrects with a dry smile. “I’m coming down, though.”

You don’t know what to say You’re trying not to cry. Or scream. Should you scream? Should you beg? He shrugs, and strides to a counter against the opposite wall. “I really did just want to trade. Then I met Jo. Sweet dog. No such thing as a bad dog, I say, just bad owners, and I’m thinking-” he looks over his shoulder for this- “this is a bad owner. Got a little hostile there, yeah. I’m a hostile guy, if you couldn’t tell.” The blood eye winks, and he uncorks a bottle of whiskey, takes a long swig before setting it back on the counter. Your head throbs. “She and Ducky are getting along great, don’t you worry. I wonder if I’ll finally get puppies.”

He’s an absolute psychopath. He kidnapped you for your dog. Fuck.

He takes the knife from the sheath on the back of his belt- you have a perfect view- and what he was fiddling with turns out to be a rope, which he cuts a length of, and crosses the space to you quickly with it. “I’ve always wanted puppies.” He nudges a cinder block towards you. It’s just out of reach from where your fingertips dangle. “When I retire, I’m gonna breed dogs.” He grabs at one of your hands, but you fight it as well as you can. He grabs you by the bicep, then the wrist, and wraps one end of the rope around. “Demand’s high, supply’s low, and I love working with dogs. I love my dogs. Grew up with the Hangdogs, heard of ‘em?”

You yank your hand out of the loop before he fully tightens it up. “Fuck off!”

He presses his lips in a thin line, and starts over. “Hangdogs are a tribe up in Dog Town. They worship dogs, if you couldn’t tell.” He yanks the rope tighter than is necessary, and threads the tail through a hole in the block, then wraps it around the other wrist. “They’re all Legion now.” He’s quiet for a moment, finishes the knot, and stands.

“Alright,” the Fiend emphasizes, “what I’m gonna do is slit your throat, and drain your blood into this barrel.” He jabs his thumb at it. “That gets dumped over the ridge for the deathclaws, and then the rest of you’s skinned and smoked.”

“You’re a fucking cannibal?” you murmur. It might be because you’re upside down, but there are tears dripping down your face.

He narrows his creepy fucking _fucked-up_ eyes. “Ew, no. They’re dog treats.”

The shock freezes you. He drags the barrel- looks like it used to be an oil drum- over. Your eyes well up more from the smell of stale blood. He hefts the cinder block onto the rim of the drum, your arms bending up. “Wait! Wait wait wait wait!”

He looks at you like you called his name in a crowded room. Like he's not holding the rest of your life in his hands. “Yeah?”

You choke.

“If you want last words, keep ‘em short. I’m gonna need to wash your blood off before my date tonight.”

You cringe. “I... I’m sorry. I should have been nicer to her, I should have-”

“I’m not listening to this.” He pushes the cinder block in, and one your shoulders dislocates, the other arm breaks, and your head hit the side of the drum. You scream in pain. He talks over it. “Fucking cowards, with the begging. Shut the fuck up.”

You choke back your words, suck up mucus. “I hope you rot in hell!” It’s the best you can think.

“That’s better.” You hear the sound of the knife again, but can’t hold your chin up to see. A hand comes to the grown-out hair at the back of your neck, wraps up tight, and then the knife’s glinting in front of your face, and then you feel it against your neck. You don’t risk breathing.

“Fuckin’ dumbasses,” he mumbles, “no one ever thinks I enjoy this.” He chuckles. “Enjoy the shit out of it.”

There’s a short, sharp pain, followed by a long, pulsing one, and the pain fades away. It’s the last you have.


End file.
